Supported, Concerned, Submitted, Best Wishes

Lei Chuang looks the part of an activist. When we met, he was 26 years old and enrolled in an engineering graduate program at Shanghai Jiaotong University. He wore long hair and thin-framed glasses. He spoke about Chinese politics and society without reservation.

Lei's issue was discrimination, specifically discrimination against carriers ofHepatitis B. The virus is transmitted through blood and other bodily fluids and can cause cirrhosis of the liver and other life-threatening conditions. In China, vaccination programs remain underdeveloped, and recent estimates suggest the country may have as many as 130 million carriers (Niu 2011). The disease is particularly widespread in rural areas, where doctors have a tendency to reuse syringes, and citizens are less aware of the risk of transmission.

Hepatitis B carriers in China are a stigmatized group, both socially and professionally. Most citizens lack basic knowledge about how the virus is spread, and many wrongly believe that sharing food or chopsticks with carriers brings risk of infection. A 2005 survey by the Chinese Foundation for Hepatitis Prevention and Control (CFHPC) shows that 37.5% of respondents from Sichuan and Guangzhou said they would not want to work or eat at a table with carriers of the virus (Lu 2006). Employers are not legally permitted to inquire about a prospective employee's carrier status, but many do so anyway. Carriers are routinely denied employment once traces of the virus are discovered in their blood samples during mandatory physicals. Another survey found that 35% of state-owned enterprises publicly stated that they would not employ Hepatitis B carriers. Over 60% screen their employees for the virus, paying a trivial fine for doing so (“Hepatitis B Carriers” 2012).

Lei is a Hepatitis B carrier himself and has some personal experience with discrimination. In 2007, his brother signed an employment contract with a company in Wuhan, but was later refused employment because of his condition. In August of that year, Lei began his first of many awareness campaigns, walking around city streets holding a sign reading, “I am a Hepatitis B carrier” (Zheng and Sun 2012). In 2011, he started writing letters to Premier Wen Jiabao – one new letter every day – asking him to dinner as a representative of the Hepatitis B community.The dinner would publicly demonstrate that there is no risk of infection from sharing ameal.